Thinking in Four Dimensions
by 94 Bottles Of Snapple
Summary: Spoilers for VLR and 999. A being called ? has a lot to say about Dio, and an offer to make to a girl who is Less Than Zero. Admittedly more personal speculation than anything.


**A/N: Because I can be ? if I want. No, I don't own anything but the game cartridge. Rife with conspiracy theory and speculation about ZE3.**

* * *

I study all of them in turn, but he is the one who holds my interest. The supposed variable in the equation, even though this was everyone's plan all along. You'll understand in time.

It's almost pathetic to watch him. But I do it over and over. Little details are different here and there – did he mention in this timeline that he'd committed some sort of sin involving women? No, it was the other one – it's hard to keep track of the when and where when you can see everything almost at once. He Allied with Luna, and that interests me, but I can speculate later, when I'm busy saving the rest of your world. There are other things I need to know. So I hop back and forth between the timelines to check it, to study it. Pathetic.

I'm far from omniscient; I can only follow the timelines of Klim's consciousness right now, as far as I can tell. But it's still easy to think looking down on them all how sad and pathetic this all really is. Doesn't anyone know what they're dealing with here? Doesn't anyone see what has to – _has to_ – be going on? Does Ms. Kurashiki even know? Of all of them, I might suspect her as the most knowledgeable but… There's no hint of it in her face, in her words, if she does.

How could anyone honestly think that the leader of an evil cult would be drinking his own Kool-Aid? Sure, taking what Dio says at face value is easy, since they only have to deal with him for the moment. But I've been watching, and comparing, and how on earth or moon could a man who had supposedly unleashed Armageddon on the world be stupid enough to send such an incompetent soldier on such an important mission? Yes, Dio is dedicated. But he's a fool. They're all fools, in their own ways, but…

He's in too deep to realize that his faults, his sins, are the reason he's on this mission at all. Brother doesn't want to stop the AB Project, he wants to facilitate it. The why is out of my reach while I'm still attached to Klim and the body of his clone. But there's no other explanation I can think of. I'm tempted to call them all stupid termites, in light of Dr. Klim's speech about who I can only assume is me. All these paths crossing, re-crossing, and no one but me sees the connections.

It's sad to see all that self-hate for nothing. What is he apologizing to? It's like saying sorry to an inanimate object. Begging for forgiveness of your sins from a lamp, that's how useless it is. Brother doesn't care about a sense of modesty, and he never did. It's all about perpetuating the image, I'm sure. Well, and keeping them all thoughtless. The less contact with others on a deep emotional or physical level the clones have, the less chance they have of losing the effects of their indoctrination. That said, it's all practical, there was never any real desire for _purity_ from them. They're no more above the sins of the world than anyone else, and that's the truth. But the psyche of one pathetic clone – and all the rest, I'm sure, though I haven't had the chance to meet them yet, and there will be at least one waiting for me at the Mars Testing Facility, I'm sure – has been all but ruined, and for what? There is no way that Brother believes the bullshit he spews, and there's even less of a chance that his exalted race of new humans is going to be the Left clones. They're just pawns. I doubt they're even clones of Brother's brother at all. But they don't know that. Or, at least, Dio doesn't. Sent on a dead-end mission for the express purpose of failing. Pathetic. On some level, it's hard to watch. But on others, it's hard to look away. I'll need this, need to remember it all.

These idiots could never reach Timeline E without me.

Does Brother know that? Is that his game? As if I'd want to meet with someone like that anyway, except to shut him up. Gods, I want to shut him up. I just want all of this to end. Admittedly, Junpei is right. Or, this Junpei. There's another one, I know there is, who is just stepping into the blinding sun of the Nevada Desert. But he's of no import for the moment. What I mean is, this timeline is going to keep going, whether Timeline E is reached or not, and everyone stuck here is going to have to live with it. Unlike me. I have to live with nothing.

Gods, it's all a game to everyone involved, except me, even though I'm the one looking down on them from an excessive height and a tower of arrogance to boot. But the ends justify the means. No matter what we've ruined here, there's a future past that can be saved. Let's just play around with peoples' lives in the hopes that something extraordinary will come to pass.

Not that it hasn't. They tied me to Kyle's body, at least. And with a knowing proposition from Ms. Kurashiki, no less. As if I would refuse to help after wasting so much of my time on these idiots. I'm more than a little drawn to the whole thing. And gods I want to punch Brother in the throat. The old bastard. I'm almost daring him to show up at the Mars Testing Facility. Once I get there. I've got all the time in the world, after all, and I'm using it to study the effects of Brother. You could call Dio that, I suppose. An effect. But I'm trying to use him as a lens, and that makes things tricky. Like gauging distance through a kaleidoscope. How much of this is fact, and how much of it is projection? How much of Brother is in his Myrmidon? How do you define someone by the cleverly orchestrated failures of their subordinates? The answers spin and haze through the morphogenetic fields like a mirage in front of me and I just want to know.

But I'll have to wait a while longer.

Wait for me, little girl, as you run and plan. Wait for me while you grow and twist and change into something, someone else. Wait for me with your brother close at your side and an idealistic fool hot on your heels. I'll see you all together someday.

I'm ready to break through every time and place you know as truth to get to something more. This timeline and all the others be damned, I have a clear goal now, and I'm racing towards it. You might not have my loyalty, but you have my interest and for now that's enough. I've been watching you through the eyes of others all this time. Watching you through their eyes and the eyes that will someday be yours, Girl Who Is Less Than Zero. And I'm going to help.

I'm ready to make you a hero, Akane Kurashiki.


End file.
